


Songs in The Deep

by SonofCalypso



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Falling In Love, M/M, Mermaids, Merpeople, Soldier Shiro (Voltron), Tragic Romance, War, merfolk, mermaid, mermaid lance, mermaid!lance, shance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-13 21:10:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15373383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SonofCalypso/pseuds/SonofCalypso
Summary: Long ago The Moon Goddess Allura fell in love with a beautiful human youth and pursued him, but so great was her love and so brilliant her glory that it killed the young man while in the throws of passion. Saddened and distraught, The Goddess flung herself into the sea attempting to transform herself into a fish and swim away to the deepest darkest part of the ocean. However, her beauty and power were so great that the seas themselves refused her and the transformation was halted halfway.That form was the state in which all her children were born.  though lacking their mother's beauty, ugly and misshapen things. The Night God Alfor, at the behest of his daughter, took pity on her children and allowed her to grant them beauty only slightly less than that of their mother. Alfor also placed a gift and curse on his grandchildren. Should any mermaid manage to lie with a mortal man and claim him for her own, then she would be granted Immortality.And so Lance and his sisters, now of age and with men so close by readied themselves.





	1. Ships and Songs

Lance swam for days. Eager, almost desperate to distance himself from his island and his sisters.  
He could not afford to slow or allow himself to float or drift, else his fish half would end up instinctively leading him back. So he swam onward, leaving all he had ever known behind him.  
Had things gone as he imagined, perhaps, he wouldn’t have needed to swim away from home, but how could he have known.

They were young, he and his 12 beautiful sisters. Young and beautiful and eager. They were young and ships had been spotted off the horizon. They had made themselves beautiful and alluring as possible. The wove wreaths of lilies, and shells, and coral into their hair, even lance who as the only male had hair that reached barely below his ears.  
His insides had been a quiver with anticipation and excitement. Ships meant men and men meant many things for young mermaids. They held unknown pleasures that would take them from the world of children into the world of adulthood and more. As was true for all mermaids, men meant immortality.

Long ago the moon goddess Allura fell in love with a beautiful human youth and pursued him, but so great was her love and so brilliant her glory that it killed the young man while in the throws of passion. Saddened and distraught, the goddess flung herself into the sea attempting to transform herself into a fish and swim away to the deepest darkest part of the ocean. However, her beauty and power were so great that the seas themselves refused her and the transformation was halted halfway.  
That human form was the state in which all her children were born but ugly and misshapen things. The night god Alfor at the behest of his daughter took pity on her children and allowed her to grant them beauty only slightly less than that of their mother. Alfor also placed a gift and curse on his grandchildren. Should any mermaid manage to lie with a mortal man and claim him for her own then she would be granted Immortality.

And so Lance and his sisters, now of age and with men so close by readied themselves. Once they were as inviting as they could be they swam to the far side of the island where a steep cliff face jutted out of the sea. At the base of the cliff where a cluster of steps washed and worn away by the sea where he and his sister had practiced there singi9gn for so many years, and beneath them hidden by the frothing water were rough and jagged rocks.  
The sun had been high in the sky and warmed lances tanned brown skin making the dusting of scales along his shoulders and back stand out like glittering freckles. A light breeze ruffled his dark brown hair as he and the others had bustled about using their long fishlike tails to slither and climb up onto the rocks  
“the ships are close!” Veronica had called out pointing off into the distance.  
Sure enough there on the line of the sea could be made out billowing white sails.

Thinking back to that moment, how lance wished he never laid eyes on those sails. Should he never see another seafaring vessel it would be too soon.

They had readied themselves to sing the one song that would bring men to them.  
Mermaids had songs for all things under the sun. however, there was a song that was every mermaid’s pride and joy, the one each perfected to their own unique level of mastery was the song of enthrallment.  
Rumour had it that mermaids learned their songs from the Sirens who took pity on them and taught them to sing. If you were to ask a siren herself, however, she would say mermaids stole their song and bastardized it by adding words. Mermaids Sing. Sirens vocalize

So slowly one by one he and his sisters had begun to sing notes bolster and pushing and supporting each other whiles other notes wove around one another creating a tapestry of song.

_Come to the place where mermaids dwell_  
_Follow the call of Triton’s shells_  
_We'll fill your sails with friendly winds_  
_And point the way with shining fins_  
_And you can bid your cares farewell_

_Come to the place where mermaids dwell_  
_In dreams you know the way so well_  
_For if you hope and you believe_  
_You'll see the golden nets we weave_  
_You'll hear the stories that we tell_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell_  


_In our embrace, you’ll know such pleasures_  
_Here, by our side the whole night long_  
_Strings of pearls and sunken treasures_  
_Come, heed our song_  


_Come to the place where mermaids dwell_  
_Where shimmering ocean waters swell_  
_Where singing daughters of the waves_  
_They lie and wait in sunken caves_  
_Come hear the magic of our spell_  


_Come to the place where mermaids dwell_  
_(Come to the place where mermaids dwell)_  
_In dreams you know the way so well_  
_For if you hope and you believe_  
_You'll see the golden nets we weave_  
_You'll hear the magic in our spell_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell..._

Lance Swore he would never sing again. He’d never let his voice lapse into any song but above all, he would never sing the song of enchantment for as long as he may live.  
Their song had filled the sir, riding over the waves and on the backs of the wind filling the air like sweet smelling fragrance. They almost felt the moment their song filling the ars of the men on their boats.  
Slowly two boats broke from the line of the others and began to drift towards their island. Lance had naively poured his soul and every desire his little heart held into his song, willing the sailors closer and closer with every word.  
Each mermaids voice took hold of men differently depending on the man in question at his core and promised their deepest de4sires. Promising different pleasure beyond their imagination. Slowly the ships drew near and lance entertained that he could make out the features of the men aboard. Some were leaning far over the railing calling out to them, others hanging from the rigging of their sails, so recaptured were they by the heady thrill of mermaid song.  
Below the cliff hidden under the frothing water below their singing rocks rested the jagged rocks and Lance couldn’t believe he didn’t think for even a second what that could mean. They weren’t stupid though. He and his sister knew the ship would crash on the rocks, ripping the hull to shreds but they had planned it all. They would leap into the water and save the men one by one. There were twelve of them and they were strong swimmers despite their slight frames, their tails and arms and cores were filled with muscles. They could care two each at least. The men would be so grateful that they would fall in love at first sight. That was the plan.  
They had been so stupid.  
The first ship ran aground on the rocks and the crack and snap of the wooden hull being torn and splintered apart were so loud it almost drowned out their song. Still, foolishly Lance had sung on like his sisters. He was almost giddy with the prospect of saving the man who would grant him his immortality. Maybe it would take the first time and he would get to lay with at least two or three of them before the day was out.  
However, their spell could not overshadow the men’s desperate fear. 

Even now lance could not understand how men who chose to sail the seas of the world had never learned how to swim. His sisters were so excited that the cried of drowning men fell on deaf ears as they leap into the water to save their soon to be lovers.  
They only managed to save 9 of the over a dozen that had been on board. 2 more had saved themselves by clinging to pieces of driftwood. They had been anything but happy or grateful to Lance and the others. They cursed and raged from the shore. They called them devils and temptresses, evil foul beast of the sea. They threw stones at them demanding silence when he or any of his sisters tried to speak or explain. They still tried to make themselves look demure and entrancing but that seemed only to infuriate the men further. They threatened to kill them if they drew to close to shore, to crush them beneath stones should they so much as utter a word.  
At the times, he and sisters did not understand. Could not understand. They had been told by elders and those of other pods for centuries that men would love them. That their song would give them all they desired. For days they watched at a safe distance in the water as the men struggled to survive the harsh island.  
They could find no fresh water to drink and game to hunt for the island held only large white lilies and birds that were too quick and too agile to catch.  
Their lips grew cracked and skin turned red and ashen.  
Once Plaxum had tried to inform them to eat the lilies of the island, the held water, and their petals were sweet. One of the men screamed over and threatened her with a makeshift spear.  
The few who could actually swim (if that was what you wanted to call the jerky frog-like movements they performed) tried to salvage what bits and pieces they could from the wreckage of their ship, threatening them all the while that if they drew close they would kill them. 

Lance found it laughable now thinking back on it. the men where so week and clumsy in the water that they truly held no threat what so ever. But he and his sister feared them for their aggression and anger and headed the warning.  
But when the men would retreat inland for the night they would dive and swim and collect everything they could form the wreckage and pile it up high on the sand.  
The men never thanked them.

One day, a day Lance would never forget, never be able to shake from his mind, one of the men did not come back up from his dive.  
Florana had been the one closest by, watching at a distance as they dove as deep as they could to try and fish and salvage, she swam up from the depth in a panic.  
“Octavius the giant has him! he swam too close to its cave!” she cried  
Lance and two of his others swam down with her to recuse the sailor  
They pulled and tugged and tried to persuade Octavious that the man was not a threat nor would he make a good meal as they were boney and small.  
By the time he released him, however, it was too late. They swam back to the surface pale and blue  
Florana was the one who drug him from the sea onto the shore as her sisters and Lance hover in the deep water. She weeps and wails over his body. Lance remembered sharing in her greifto some degree but now he is confused as to what she was truly crying for. Was it grief at the loss of chance of immortality? It couldn’t be that she loved this man. Loved this man who with the other had threatened and hated them. This man who she barely knew from the others.  
The other men had bee scattered about here and there on the beach and had watched them drag the dead sailor to the shore.  
Florana was so lost in her grief and mourning that she did not see one of them leap out from behind a rock and run towards her he grabbed her by her long coral pink hair and dragged her higher onto land  
To the horror of he and his sisters, they began to kick and punch and bash her. She screamed, shriekingly high causing several of them to stumble backward and she kept shrieking, higher and higher till Lance could see men doubling over.  
The man who had pulled her onto the beach picked up a large stone and brought it crashing down on her head, over and over and over. The other join in, the smash her ribs and head  
Verdona, the eldest of them, shoved lance away from the shore as he had been closest.  
They all screamed and cried and wailed in the sea. If they go on land, they will be killed but staying in the water unable to help their sister is hideous and cruel. So they scream and cry. Lanc’s voice goes horse and he can not hear his own shrieks of horror and sadness any longer.  
They throw arms full of lilies on Florana’s body.  
“vicious whore from hell.” He spits on what was once her beautiful face.  
His sisters and he are shocked into tearful silence  
One of the men, the one who had dragged Florida and delivered the first killing blow, turns to them in the water and screamed to them.  
“horrid flowers. yours grow these putrid things to deceive sailors into thinking this rock of an island welcomes them, then you bid us eat them! They are poisonous to our very souls. Stay away or we will kill her and bury you with flowers as well.

His words seem so far off, so unreal.  
Their sister is dead.  
Something bubbles up inside Lance. Something dark and angry  
It spreads through his sisters like in, blooming in water. It settles hard and heavy, somewhere behind his throat and in the line of his shoulders.  
The setting sun seems to retreat from them, frightened by what is growing within them. Light gave way to shadows and darkness  
Something awakens inside of them and could still feel it even now as he swims far from that island and that night.  
As the sun set, a change over took he and sisters.  
Their eyes bled black, the pupils glowing like pinpricks of gems in darkness in an array of dazzling eerie colors.  
Plaxum’s in green, Veronica’s yellow, Verdona’s purple and Lance’s in blue.  
Their cheeks hollowed and their hair turned silver white. The light dusting of scales that freckled their shoulders, cheeks, and temples grew more numerous and noticeable. Their long nails became talon-like, the webbing between each fingers growing thicker.  
They had become something beautiful and ghastly, wild and cruel.

After that night Lance realized that the monsters they had been born as so long ago had never really been purged from them. It was always there, just below the surface, waiting.

As the moon rose high in the sky, glowing eyes and white head bobbed in the deep dark water. Verdona and Veronica opened their mouth first and begun to sing, lance followed and then the others falling in behind him.  
It was the song of enchantment.. but different. There was a darkness around the edge of each word. Harsher and more demanding. There would be and could be no refusal to this. It was not a suggestion to come, not a sweet enticement. It was a demand, an order laced with the promise of heady desire and need.  
The shadow of the song of enchantment, its twin in every way but its tone and meaning.

 _Come to the deep where mermaids dwell_  
_Follow the call of Siren’s spell_  
_Harken to pleading voices on the wind_  
_We’ll show you where your journey ends_  
_And you can bid your world farewell_

_Come to the deep where mermaids dwell_  
_Follow the call, you know so well_  
_There is no hope to be retrieved_  
_You'll see the golden nets we weave_  
_Bend to you magic of your spell_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_

Slowly, sluggishly the men walked out from the dense jungle of the island. there movements dragging and jerky, like puppets on strings, face blank.  
Still louder he and his had sung. Matching the mend down the slopes of the sandy beach and into the surf. Lance could remember it all so clearly and could remember how his mouth watered in anticipation as fangs that had ever been used for anything more than tearing fish seemed to have an all too clearer and more useful purpose now.  
Whereas first, they had been hungry for love, they now hungered for something else. A hunger stoked and fed by revenge for their dead sister.

_In our embrace, you’ll know such pleasures_  
_Here, by our side, the whole night long_  
_Strings of pearls and sunken treasures_  
_Come, heed our song_

 

_Into the deep where mermaids dwell_  
_Where shimmering ocean waters swell_  
_Where ghostly children of the waves_  
_Lure you away to sunken graves_  
_You’ll bid the world above farewell_

 

_Into the place where mermaids dwell_  
_(Come to the deep where mermaids dwell)_  
_In dreams you know the way so well_  
_For there is no hope to be retrevied_  
_You'll see the golden nets we weave_  
_Come bid the world of light farewell_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell_  
_(Where mermaids dwell)_  
_Where mermaids dwell..._

 

What followed would make Lance’s stomach turn for the rest of his life? Not a single man had survived their vengeance. The waters bloomed red even into the next morning when they had risked the shore to collect Florana’s body and carry her to the deep waters where she could dissolve into sea foam in peace  
Things went back to normal and Lance had swum for days, wanting to mourn his sister alone but also needing time to process.  
His sisters while still kind and loving, even boarding into somewhat overprotective now, had developed a sharpness about them. And edge to their usual soft demeanor. He noticed it in himself as well. Whatever Florana’s murder had awoken in them still lingered just below their skin like an infection.  
Even more upsetting was how easily they had slipped into that… darker part of themselves. He had almost expected them all to wake the next morning with no idea, assuming the men had simply died but no, they knew what they had done and how and why the men would no longer come to comb the beach. It unsettled him, even now. So far from home. He feared that part of himself.

But the horror was not to end there. It was nearly a month before they saw another ship and Lance had figured he and his sisters were of the same mind. The wounds from before too fresh and raw and they would simply ignore it. much to his shock his sister grew giddy and excited as they had before and went about making themselves presentable, then swim to their singing rock.  
He swam after them imploring them to stop.  
“no” he had shouted loud and desperate. Panic rushed over him. They could not sing. Not ever again.  
But his sisters ignore him and rise smoothly from the waters up onto their rocks.  
He grabbed Plaxum’s arm tugging and pulling almost off her rock.  
She slapped him with her tail, hard across the shoulder and head.  
“why are you making trouble lance! There are men on that ship. Come sit next to me and soon they will be ours.”  
“have you forgotten!” Lance cried up to her imploringly.  
“the men will drown!  
“we will have post in the sea. As the ship crashes we will have sisters in the waters. They will love us”  
But lance cannot shake the rage of the other men, screaming at them and calling them monsters. They will never love them! Desperation makes rigid lines in his sister's necks and, along their ribs, gills flushed and pulsating. Immortality is a promise like fresh water after a desert.  
He tries again  
“they will die! They will die of lack of fresh water and food. They will starve and die!”  
“we will sing continuously. They will love us!”  
“even if they love us they will die!”  
“they will love us first!”  
And there it is, with the flash of green in Plaxum’s eyes, the slight hollowing of her cheeks and the peek of fangs behind dewy lips.  
Lance just stared on in shock as his sister turned towar5sds the ships on the horizon and began to sing. The song of enthrallment was beautiful but there was something dark around the edges. Lance fought the urge that welled in him to join but it was bubbling up in his throat. So he dove and swam away. He swam and swam until the song of the island was only a whisper on the wind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've wanted to do a mermaid Lance fic for so long but none of the stories I came up with seemed to fit, either with the characters themselves or with my writing style. so I decided to pull inspiration from somewhere else and see where it took me. This fic is inspired by the Book Sirena byDonna Jo Napoli. It's a beautiful story and if you like mermaids and tragic love stories, you should give it a read.  
> I really hope everyone enjoys this story as it unfolds. it's honestly one of the first fanfics I've done in a very long time that I'm really invested in.  
> Please feel free to comment and let me know what you think, and even drop some suggestions if you like  
> and of course, Kudos and comments are always highly needed to keep me motivated


	2. No Man's Island

So he swam.  
For nights and days, he swam. Not allowing himself to rest, too scared that his tail would instinctively lead him back home, to Veradera, the island of death where his sisters and he had been tainted and turned into something else

He was beyond grateful when he came to the large heavily forested island. it was so out of the way no ships would likely ever come that far out. That and the fact that the island had a gruesome reputation. Nearly a century ago the women of the island had risen up against the oppression of the men and killed them all. If he was lucky he ’d never lay an eye on another man for the rest of his life, which, now that Lance thought on it, would belong as were the lives of all his kind but eventually… he would die. He’d never be immortal and would grow old and die.  
There had been a time when the thought had upset him. Who wouldn’t be upset by the thought of mortality when immortality was literally a song away, but now he found he had at some point made peace with the idea.  
All things died, fish, turtles, and even squid.  
And now so would he, some far off day.  
Lance simply told himself that truly on some level, things had not changed. Had the ship never come to their island and he and his sisters never saw one from that moment on, then he would have died anyway. So there was no real change. He would die and he was fine with that truth. He rather be dead, than alive at the cost or control of another life

Lance swam around surveying his new home. The island was lush and there seemed to be a small mountain range at its center. He could make a small dark spot along the ridge, a cave of some sort.  
He hoped he never in countered whatever called it home. He swam to a small outcropping of stones, not far from the sloping white beach and climbed up to rest there in the lazy evening heat of the slowly sinking sun. he laid on his stomach facing the eastern sky the last rays of sunlight beginning to die below the line of the sea. Lance forced himself to stare into the sinking sun. maybe the blinding light will purify his sight. He wanted to believe it would burn out all that he had seen all that he now knew of himself and the nature of his world. Leave him innocent and nieve once again.  
All he gets are spots dancing before his vision and watery eyes.

He’s awakened later by the crying of a rooster which makes him take pause. There must have been remnants of human life on the island still.  
Slipping from his rock into the cool water, his scales awakening, revitalized from his long rest on the dry stone.  
“might as well explore my new home”  
Ther outer shallows will do for the day. There is no rush. He has plenty of time. The rest of his life.

The island is immense yet not as expansive as Veradera. The plant life is lush and green and fruits and flowers can be seen even from the water. There are mangroves that dipper long-reaching roots into the water like the arms of some great creature. Their branches heavy with leaves, that hide the jungle beyond. Lance can hear the cry of birds, their song so different than the ones of Veradera island.

Lance is almost surprised when he finds a beautiful grotto deep set into the western rockface of the island under a deep incline from high up on the mountain ridges. Its smaller than the one he shared with his sisters and deeper with a small waterfall sparkling on a sandy pebbled beach.  
The water is fresh and almost crystal, clearer then it is around the rest of the island though it still holds the green hue that Lance finds himself being a tad bit annoyed by. His scales were too blue to blend in with the green water. Maybe over time, they would shift to fit his new home better.  
A cluster of rocks in the center of the grotto that catches lance’s attention they are would be perfect for lounging and sunning himself and he considers making this his own. A place to return to sleep and rest but puts the idea aside for the time.  
There is so much more of the island to explore and why limit himself to just one area when the entire island is his.  
“lets put a pin in this one,” he thinks, committing the place to memory before setting off again.

He finds a human hut on the beach. Its small and the roof is collapsed. He doesn’t explore it. mainly because he would have to crawl onto the beach and he doesn’t want to be vulnerable to whatever animals may be lurking in the underbrush, but mainly because he simply doesn’t want anything to do with human things

Days pass  
Lance enjoys all the little things. He sees a parade of large blue lobsters, claws clinging to the tails of each one before it. A family of birds, Lance does not know the name for, dive into the sea and fight over their catch as they take back to the air.  
The waves on the island get high. Almost towering and powerful. Lance makes up his mind he will learn to ride these waves. By nightfall, he succeeds with a happy cry as hr is crashed onto the soft white sand. He laughs.  
A bear growls from somewhere on the mountain. Lance wonders if perhaps it lives in the dark cave he could see atop it. maybe the humans slew its ancestor and it roams here still.

In the evening, the coo of doves lulls Lance to sleep and the scream of a leopard in the dead of night sends him sprawling from his sleeping rock into the water rather ungracefully.  
He is aware of the passage of time, of the dawn, the noon, the evening, and the night, but he dutifully forces himself not to keep track.

One afternoon a shark glides by him as he swims there are many sharks around the island but they are small and nearly harmless. More likely to dart away as he swims by than to attack. This one, however, is larger and could have taken off Lance's head with one bite had it so chosen to. Lance fled back to his rock in fear. After all, he is still mortal now. Mortal still and would be for all time.  
He lays sprawled out on the rock, chest heaving with fear and adrenaline.  
Suddenly anger bubbles up, ugly and violent. Had he a mirror he was sure his eyes would have been glowing and the fine dusting of scales that were barely noticeable on his face would have been more noticeable.  
If he succumbed to his fear, his entire life would become small and dry, until no joy and pleasure could fill him at all, through his wall of fear. He had to learn to fight and face his fears head-on. Though it made him uneasy to recall it and sent panic and dread through his veins like ice, if he had learned anything from that night on the island, it was that he was stronger and more capable than he ever thought.  
Lance had to allow himself adventure and the fear that came with it. so he slipped slowly back into the water and sought out the bully of a shark who thought he could run him away.  
It loomed in the shifting shadows of the water, almost invisible due to its bluish grey coloring, but Lance’s eyes were keen.  
The shark had noticed him too and begun to make large slow circles around him. Sharks may not have been as smart as Dolphins, octopi or tuna, but they were far from stupid or mindless.  
They lock eyes his circles grow tighter. Lance doesn’t move. He keeps his body still in the water floating upright body rigid yet limbs loose. His eyes sharp and following.  
He allows the shark to draw in close enough for their sides to bump, enough to feel the soft sandpapery feel of its hide. He knew that the next circle around the beast will attack and he is ready.  
He sees the movement out the corner of his eye, and before the great shape can dart forward, teeth gnashing, lance moves quick as silver flashing and is above the shark in a second. Grabbing the on to the sark dorsal fins and locking his other arm around the shark’s neck just behind its gills. The panic was immediate and the monster began to thrash, swimming in blind rage and shock.  
“this is my island!” Lance hisses into the small hole on the side of the shark’s head that served as its inner ear. He rides the hulking thing as it speeds through the water thrashing and rolling in an effort to dislodge lance from its back.  
Contrary to what mortals believe mermaids cannot talk to fish. Most fish are far too simple and too stupid with no sense of self-awareness, no sentience. The larger, smarter ones, however, can be communicated with though emotion and intent  
So Lance knew the shark was upset and angry and that it wanted Lance off, but lance needed this creature to understand. He would not live his life in fear in his new phone. He would not be run from the waters or threatened or bullied.  
“this island is mine,” he repeated.  
“its mine now and I will not flee from you like some stupid fish.”  
He growled low in his throat sinking sharp nails into the rough hide of the shark dangerously near to its gills.  
There was fear now and worry. Gills are very sensitive and if damaged can lead to choking and even suffocation if the ower of the gills did not bleed out first.  
The shark slowed its sped and its thrashes grew small and weak as it listened intently to Lance.  
“I will not hunt you like some stupid fish if you do not hunt me either. I am faster than you and my far better. He hissed releasing his hold a bit.  
The beat seemed to understand and nodded in agreement. So lance let go swimming a short distance away to allow the shark to find its bearings.  
It shook and thrashed for a moment, as though Lance were still riding it then turned and regarded the young mermaid for a long time. Then it simply swam off.  
Lance entertained the idea that it had bowed its head to him as it retreated.

He had done it. He could barely contain himself. He had bested a creature he had been told all his life that he should fear and avoid. It had been dangerous and stupid but he had done it. Pride welled up in him, building up so quickly;y and profoundly he almost gave in to the urge to let it spill out. He almost let it himself revel so deeply in his joy and triumph that a song was already pressing up along his throat like fire from a dragon.  
Lance nearly bit his tongue off when he slammed his jaw and left the song o to die behind his lips.

The next morning Lance is basking on his rock still savoring his every breath after besting the shark he has chosen to name Hunk due to its size. He rolls over on his stomach and notices a wake in the water moving towards him. A water serpent lifts its venomous head and hisses at him, flicking ti slender forked tongue. Lance is almost sure he can hear a word in the hiss but he is not sure.  
Sea Serpents are related to sea dragons and thusly capable of a form of speech though they are not as intelligent as their ancestors. Water Serpents even less so. Wearily lance pulls his long tail from the waters, scooting back on the rock and putting a bit of distance between himself and the serpent. Sharks were one thing, but sea and water serpents were another. They spit toxins and their venom could burn through rock. Through water-serpents are less far less aggressive than their sea serpent brethren and smaller too lance had a sudden intense feeling of weariness because of this one.  
“Ssssss” it insists, emptying its one lung in the effort.  
The colors of it look familiar to Lance, the onyx black of the scales and the light grey markings along its back. On top of its head was a long stripe of crimson red, its fin-like ears on either side forming a blue crest-like shape.  
Lance realized he did know this creature even if it were by stories alone. The was the Serpent Kova, a pet of the witch Goddess Haggar, the wife of the merciless god of death and war Zarkon.  
Why would Haggar send her serpent to him? He had done nothing to offend the wicked goddess.  
“I have done the goddess Haggar no ill.” He spoke almost cowering from the snake as it raised its elf higher out of the water to stare at him in the eyes.  
Kova slung its wide head from side to side as though to disagree. Another Serpent, smaller and without the crest that marked Kova as Haggar’s, swam up beside Kova. Both lifted their heads towards lance in double threat.  
Why were they here? He had no reason be he visited by this beast. He had done nothing.  
“you aren’t looking for me. You have the wrong boy.” He tried.  
“I’m not the one.” There was a prayer on his voice.  
The smaller serpent suddenly leaped and twisted away in one movement and for a second lance feared it meant to attack him but no, when it resurfaced he could see the tail of a mighty blue fish disappearing down its throat.  
Kova lowered its head and struck at the head of the fish. They consumed the fish together, swallowing from both ends at once. When they met, to Lance’s horror, Kova kept swallowing and consuming till both the fish and the small serpent disappeared down its throat.  
The air was still and Lance stared on in confused fear. His mouth open and dry, his breath hard.  
Kova’s body distended sickeningly as it swallowed its prey. The bugle inside, traveling down its long neck and into its belly, writhing and moving the entire way down. its eyes were on Lance against seeming to examine him as if wanting to see his reactions. It was a warning, lance realized but again what he did not know.  
Finally, Kova hisses, low and menacing “Sssssss,” and swims off.  
The serpent had put on that show for Lance’s benefit to warn him. To remind him of its power and thusly the power of its’s mistress.  
Lance knew trouble was coming his way and he prayed to the mother moon and grandfather night that he would know when to heed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnd Chapter two is up.  
> sorry, it took so long but I got it out to you guys as quickly as I could.  
> chapter 3 will see our introduction to Shiro and be told from his point of view.  
> so bare with me guys till then  
> as always comments and Kudos keep me motivated so fill free to let me know what you think


	3. Man

The ships sail away in line, sailing away from the island. Shiro stares after them. He can still make out Keith on the deck staring at him. He was sure had he been able the young man would have flung himself over the side to be with him. He’d fought so hard when the order had been sorrowfully given that they had to put him in the brig and keep him there till Shiro was off the ship and they were already sailing away. It was for the best this way He tried not to be angry. Not to allow the bitterness and sense of betrayal to overcome him. He had been cursed in the name of the opposing nations goddess which wouldn’t really have been all that bad had it not meant the loss of the use of his arm. A curse wasn’t uncommon in times of war especially when gods and goddess were involved and missing limbs weren’t strange for warriors but the combination made his too dangerous to keep around  
the garrison couldn’t afford a liability in a war against the galra ant their dark god and goddess. So they dropped him here on this island with a sword, a bow and quiver, and a small bit or rations and supplies.  
He understood, really he did. He was a soldier, a cog in the machine of conquest. When a cog doesn’t work, no matter long it had served, or how much work and effort and blood and sweat it poured into the machine, you replace it.  
He understood, really he did. So he bit his tongue and watched the ships sailing away. His wounded arm was hot and the pain was so great it splintered his vision, but he would not crumble till the ships were too far away to notice.  
He watched them go almost laughing at the fact that he knew the others were having to hold Kieth back from jumping over the ship to join him on the island. soon the ships were no more than dots in the distance, cloud-like sails billowing.  
Then and only then did he crumble. Falling to his knees in pain, clutching at the injured arm where he could feel puss, pouring out between his fingers, hot and sickly. His breath came in shivering uneven breaths as the pain racked his entire body, his vision blurring and blackening around the edges. His skin is hot and he’s sweating.  
Shiro struggled for a moment trying to compose himself as best he good before staggering to his feet, slinging his pack, bow, and quiver. Then he’s falling, the world around him fading into darkness. Everything is dark and hot. He doesn’t know how long he lays there in the inferno of darkness, dizziness, pain, and heat.  
The world around him seems to roll and tumble  
His wounds sting but there is growing relief and coolness. He knows there is pressure on the stump of his arm but he can not bring himself out of unctuousness to see what exactly is going on. So he drifts there, the heat is lessening, the pain dulling but he is still so tired so far from the waking world he cannot think beyond those simple reliefs.

When Shiro comes to, the first thing he notes is that he on his back and the sky above him is blue and clear. The sun does not blind him but he still feels its heat and the pleasant breeze from the seas. The next thing he notes it that he closer to the water than he remembers being. It laps at his side. The pain in his wound is not gone but had dulled to a distant thrum, an ache his warrior's body is more accustomed to dealing with. He doesn’t feel as hot and heavy as he did before and the breeze and the lapping water are helping. Slowly he struggles to sit up dragging his single hand down his face to push his hair, plastered to his forehead with sweat and sea mist, out of his face.  
He stares collecting himself as best he can.  
This is not where he passed out. He’s a few feet further from where he had been left and watched the ships depart. Had he crawled in his delirious state to try and reach water in an attempt to cool himself down? no, he had been unconscious he knew that.  
The trails in the sand of long been washed away.  
Suddenly he takes note of the small clay bowl beside him, almost knocking over its contents as he draws up his legs to try and stand. The bowl is filled with water and plump apricots.  
He stared around, half expecting someone to be walking along the shore but that was impossible, he knew the legends of this island. no one had lived here in centuries.  
“Hello!” he called out, struggling to his feet.  
“hello!si there anyone there! You don’t need to be afraid!”  
All the reply he got was the crash fo the waves and the cry of birds  
He wasn’t alone. He knew that. No matter how great his delirium had been in his fevered unconscious state he knew he couldn’t have gotten the bowl, water, and fruit himself. However, he was not one to turn his nose up at a gift.  
Pulling the bowl to him he took out the apricots and began to eat and drank the clear fresh water.  
There must be a spring somewhere here and fruit trees and crops left over from when the island was inhabited.  
Placing the nuts in the pocket of his grey and black tunic, Shiro gave one last look at the beach before turning to head inland and explore, hoping to come across his mysterious rescuer.

 

 

Lance rested on his back staring up at the blue sky on a rock offshore. One of the many that littered the island. he’s almost drifting when the wind shifts directions, blowing from the other side of the island. His nose catches a familiar scent before his ears perceive anything different about the day. he bolts up, body rigid and skin prickling with goosebumps.  
He dives off his rock almost against his own mental desire, seeking only to flee. He swims through thick kelp along the bottom of the seabed, wrapping himself in the long thick green strings, disturbing the small silvery and goldish seahorses that call the kelp their home. They fan out then slowly back to the cluster of weed, grabbing a hold with their curling tails, some even settling around the short strands of Lance’s hair. Once again the bottom of the seabed is placid, calm.  
How can the sea be calm when their men on his island.  
The blood pounds in Lance’s ears and he is sick with panic down to his stomach, both of them.  
He lingers there at the bottom till his heart stops pounding and he un eas calms to a degree that allows him to push off the kelp like the fear that tugged him so deep and rises to the surface.  
He follows the smell to the far end of the island and after a long while rose and scanned the area.  
Six ships had come around the side of his island. They sailed in a line, like ducks, toward the open sea. Leaving…they were leaving. Had they been there all along and Lance had simply been fortunate enough to not run into them? If so, then why had he only smelled them now? Had the shift in the wind been what had kept their scent from his keen nose and had his slow pace of exploration been able to keep them hidden?  
Men.  
Men whose hot flesh held secrets that lance longed to know deep in his soul. He withered inside from a loss he had tried to stamp down. these men had been here and he had been ignorant of their presence.  
But the ships were leaving. The men were departing.  
Lance fought back the gloom of disappointment that began to settle over him. He had already come to terms with his future alone and it was better that way. For the men and for him.

He swims past the ships underwater. When he is behind the sixth ship he surfaces. A seventh ship is anchored near the sandy beach in the sheltered cove lance had refused to settle in.  
His throat thickens with the anticipation of danger. Lance must not let himself be seen, he knows that all too well. So he watches, still and hidden as a crab. 

Two men stand on the stand talking with a third who sits in the sand. One looks solemn and the other vibrates with anger to papable lance can feel it like heat from an oven even this far away. The angry one shouts and lance strains to hear him but the wind snatches his words and takes them someplace far. The other man hands the sitting one a bow, a quiver, and a small satchel.  
The sitting man slings the bow and quiver of arrows over his shoulder. The angry one argues and the man sitting stand to try and calm him down, their hands flying wildly. Now the two men slosh through the water, the one practically dragging the other angry man with him back to the ship. The ones on board throw ropes to them to climb. The angry one grasps his rope and looks back at the one on the beach before he is forced to climb by the other. The oars of the boat move and the ship departs.

Lance watches in disbelief. They have abandoned the man on the beach. Why would they do that? Why leave him behind on this island. what could he have done? Mermaids would never abandon their own. They live in as a school, a shoal. They swim, eat, sleep as a group. Lance’s childhood insistence on doing things on his own had been such an anathema to his sisters due to that very communal nature. Even his choice now to live alone would beyond their understanding. He was sure they must believe him dead.

The man stands on the beach watching the ships depart. He stands for a long time still and watching before turning. His entire body seizes and he falls to his knees, he says there then struggle to his feet again. He stands tall for all of a minute before he on the ground again, sprawled out like a dead fish. Lance watches and waits but the man does not move again. Is he ill?  
He waits, always hidden, eyes just above the surface. The sun crosses from one end of the sky to the center and still, the mand does not move.  
Birds began to circle above, scavengers.  
Lance swims fast to the beach, pulling himself across the sand, like a walrus as the birds began to dive bomb the man aiming to pick at his flesh.  
He snarls and claws at them catching one in his long talons, breaking its neck before flinging it across the beach as a warning to others.  
They fly away screaming.  
His hands reach, webbed fingers hovering, but he knows not where to touch. There is a man… so close to him. He trembles. then with swift determination, he pushed the man onto his back. He is young. Not as young as Lance of course but young.  
He is unconscious but his chest rises and falls heavily. He is hot, and an unwanted memory of that night on the island with his sister provides him with the knowledge that men run hotter than mermaids, but this man is too hot, hotter than a man should be. a rock of fear settled in Lance’s stomach. His eyes wander over the man settling on his left arm. It's heavily scarred and swollen and discolored. Bruising on the swollen forearm darkens to deceased black down to the fingers. Lance wrinkles his a nose at the putrid smell coming off of it. shaking his head in an attempt to rid himself of the smell and looks closer holding his breath. Right, where the bruising, and swelling started, were two large puffy red puncture wounds. The wounds were the source of the wretched stench. The arm rots. Though the wound looks as though the man had been stabbed by some kind of two-pronged weapons Lance knows those wounds.  
The man had been abandoned because he had been bitten by a sea serpent? He needed help but all Lance wanted to do was flee back into the water. He wanted to leave the man there to die. But shame and guilt at the thought unnerve him.  
He fears to help the man for one single reason. The serpent that bit this man the one that had visited lance only a few days ago. The serpent of the goddess Hagar? That witch, that most vengeful and cunning of the goddess.  
Was this the reason the other had abandoned him and why Lance had been given his warning by the serpent.  
If lance helped this man Hagar would turn her weakness on him.  
He looks around, vultures watch from the sky above them. He turns back to the youth laid out on the sand before him. He is massive, muscular and wide shoulders, tapering down into a small waist and then flaring a bit out at his thighs. His face is hairless, unlike the men he had seen before. His hair is black save for a forelock of gleaming white hair. An old scar makes a crescent across his nose and cheeks. His lips though thin were pleasing and his jaw was strong. Lance brushed the sand from his face, fingers dancing over his lips.  
He is beautiful. Lance leans over him, his face getting closer and closer. With a sharp intake of breath, Lance realizes his urges. Sitting up tall again and takes the man’s larger hand in his small webbed ones.  
There is a silver ring with dark stones set around it. his middle fingers are callous at the midsection. From the bow and arrow no doubt. The man must have been quite the archer. He is a mystery. So much of him is forbidden to Lance.  
He wonders at his toenails and his large feet, they are untrimmed but not as long or as yellowing as those of the dead men on Veradera.

He wears a leather pouch on his thick black belt so Lance pulls at it, fish brain momentarily distracted by something shiny and new. He opens the pouch fingers dipping into the cool smooth leather and closing around something. From the pouch, he produces a small figurine carved from dark wood. A lionfish. The exact species of fish lance’s own fins and tail mimic. It is amazingly detailed and was it not so mall lance would think it almost real. This is no simple wittled piece of work, it is a masterpiece.  
Lance returns the wooden cat to its dark pouch with quick resolves. He focuses once again on Man’s wounds. Fingers flying across the two puncture wounds like insects buzzing and worrisome.  
If Hagar watches him, he will pay dearly. Lance is no fool  
But if she doesn’t, he could with luck at least relieve the man’s suffering- this man who admires lionfish enough to carve their image.

Lance was no natural born healer, he neither had the experience nor need to be. Mermaids and their kin heal on their own very quickly… or they die. But he knows something of healing as Florana had tried to teach him everything she knew. Her memory is a sour pang in his gut and pushes it aside to think of what he must do.  
The venom has to be sucked from the wound before he can do anything. So Lance lifts the pone man’s arm to his mouth and latches his lips over the two red and angry puncture wounds, careful of his own fangs and begins to suck. The wounds ooze puss that is hot and acrid on his tongue. He spits it out onto the sand.  
Lance does it over and over again till the pus begins to taste less and less tainted on his delicate tongue. He’s thankful he is immune to most venom of other sea creatures.  
Lance rolled the man heavily towards the water, till he can submerge his arm.  
He lacks the ability to manipulate the waters to heal in the wat Florona had been able too but he can manage.  
Squeezing and pushing on the wound the puss ripples out into the salt water. He pushes and squeezes over and over till until the blood milky blood runs ruby red.

The man is still unconscious and Lance isn't sure what else he should do for him. The men stranded on Veradera died for lack of fresh water. So lance pulled the large man above the water waters line, though there is no danger that the tide will rise before he returns, Lance still does it.  
Lance pulls himself across the sand and back into the water, sliding deeper and deeper till he can search the seabed. He finds nothing, however. There are no turtle shells or conch shells. he searches more but comes up empty-handed. With a hiss he turns his seeking towards the island itself, remembering the ruined human shelter he had seen so many days ago. Swimming to the far side of the island Lance maneuvers himself forward, arms then tail fin, arms then tail fin, slowly.  
The shelter a tilted shack of clay and hay. The walls have fallen away in places making it look like the carcass of some long dead creature. The door hangs from the hinges and swims open easily with the barest touch of Lance’s webbed clawed hand. With a moment of hesitation, lance moves the rubble with difficulty. The sensation of the hard-packed floor on lance’s long tail and fine fins of his fluke. He is clumsy and large. Raised on the belly of his tail like a serpent rearing back for the attack, his tail is still too long and curling for the small space. He is heavy and lost and he wants to return to the water so desperately that he almost flees the building, instinct raging against him. But Lance has a mission. The man must live.  
He finds a large clay bowl, still hole lined with beautifully painted lions. Lance secures it under his arm, his movements now hindered even more, and leave the house. He passes a walled garden on the side of the house that had gone unnoticed on his entry. Over the top of the wall, Lance can see a tree lush and laden with sunset and coral colored fruit. The branches are heavy with them since no one has been around to prune and pick the tree but it is too high for lance to reach. Luckily for him, the garden floor around the tree is covered with fruits as well. Setting down the bowl in near the base of his tail where it curls protectively around it as though it were some great treasure, Lance leaned over the stone wall and sorts through the fruits picking the ripest and plumpest ones. He plops four into his mouth, unhinging his jaw ever so slightly to accommodate the large soft fruits. his cheeks bulge.  
Picking up the bowl once more Lance turned to the water.  
Heading to the east side of the island where he had come across the grotto of fresh water. He dives deep in the lagoon using the sand to scrub the bowl till it gleams then surfaces near the small trickling waterfall to fill it with fresh clean water.  
He's hobbling trying the balance the bowl and not spill any of the precious water as he makes his way back to the beach where the man lies. His man.

He is still unconscious when lance pulls himself up the beach beside him. Lance sets the bowl carefully beside the man, his lips are parted and his hand lies with the palm up just as Lance had left it. Lance runs the ball of his fingers along the man’s finger and palms, lightly as not to cut him with his claws. Heat rushed from his cheeks to the very tip of his tail, blushing his body purple.  
He shook himself. Light touches and first blushes would not save his man.  
Lance pops the four fruits from his mouth and places them into the bowl of fresh water. Dipping a cupped hand into the water he trickles it into the man’s slack mouth. Then for good measure lance Splashes more salt water onto the wound which was already starting to look less red. Suddenly a groan escapes the man and his eyes flutter. He moans and Lance is gone into the water and bobs in the water. Watching.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally Chapter 3!!!  
> I really had to force my way through this one. think it was more structured and scheduled I'd been since high school lol  
> the next Chapter our lovebirds finally meet...kinda.  
> Please leave comments and let me know what you think. I'm always open to ideas and suggestions  
> also hit the Kudos button to let me know you like my work. it means a lot


	4. Help

The man disappeared inland that night. But now he is on the beach. Lance hides behind an offshore rock, fighting the urge to swim closer. Fighting the urge to sing. The man could harm him if he chose too and Lance… lance could harm him too if he were willing.  
The man carries the water bowl Lance had brought him yesterday. He sets it in the sand and paces. He holds his arm and Lance wonders if the pus and poison have come back. Will he know to wash it away with saltwater.  
Suddenly the man yells out, breaking Lance’s worried musings.  
“Hello! Where are you?” he calls out to the water. He kneels, pulling at his chin in wonder. His hands touch the sand gingerly and Lance is a loss in wondering just what those hands would feel like on his skin before he realizes what the man is staring at. He examines the tracks Lance had left. the winding long fissures in the sand of his body and the wide drag of his fluke behind it. His face is bewildered as he stands up, eyes scanning the sea. His expression changes to one of terror. Then suddenly he hunches over clutching at his pained arm. Lance wants so desperately to swim to him, tend to his wounds but he holds himself still in the water, hidden with only his eyes above the waves behind his rock.  
After a while, the man straightens himself and slowly extend both hands heavenward  
“Alphor! Mighty father, only you can intervene! Help me! Oh, God of all gods, Please help me!”  
Lance waits, looking up to the sky as well, half expecting Alfor himself to come and save the man but nothing happens. The clouds do not part, thunder does not roll.  
The man slumps then turns slowly and disappears into the tree line.

Lance waits. Finally, once he is sure the man has well and truly gone, he swims to the beach and looks into the bowl. Its empty save for two fruit pits.  
“Is this truly all he has eaten” lance wonders aloud. The man is large, as large as the few wild mermen Lance has seen. He is large and hunger can be cruel.  
The island is rich with food for humans Lance knows that. Bird calls make an almost constant background and at dusk, he has seen a creature he knows to be deer. There is fresh water not far inland. And the old human villages still stand so there is shelter, but still, Lance worries. The man should take better care of himself. Maybe his arm hurts so much, the pain disorientates him.  
Lance pulls the bowl behind in the water as he swims around the island again to the freshwater grotto. He cleans the bowl in sand once more, then fills it with fresh clean water.  
He brings it back to the beach grateful that the man is nowhere in sight. He leaves the bowl in the sand exactly where the man had set it and swims to the small beach shack. Lance makes his way to the walled garden. His tail is still sore and rubbed a bit raw from yesterday's efforts but his determination is much greater.  
The man may survive, and he prays to Alphor. He is a sensible man, and worth saving.

Lance crossed the rough ground carefully, searching for the easiest path. This time he chooses to go through the gate. Bedraggled flowers bushes surround a large fountain, full of muddy water and dark brown fish and dull green frogs. Lance, is reminded of stories his sisters told him of their cousins, mermaid who lived in lakes and pounds and lacked their vibrant colors.  
He manages to make his way over to the fruit trees, sliding and slithering along on the belly of his tail, torso raised like a snake. He’s thankful, not for the first time for the thin coating of mucus that clings to his scales and keeps him somewhat wet.  
Suddenly his ear hears the cracking of a stick somewhere nearby.  
Is a predator near?   
He hurries, snatching six fruits from the ground and place them in his mouth, fully unhinging his jaw to accommodate their size. His cheeks bulged obscenely, like a blowfish. Lance labors to the sea and brings the fruits back to the man’s beach. He leaves them in the water of the bowl.

The man is large, and Lance knows a human of his size cannot survive on fruit alone. Lance wrack his brain trying to remember what exactly humans eat. Lamb? No, he couldn’t acquire it even he wanted to. Or could he, sing a young Yue to the water edge and drown it. the thought of singing churns his stomach. No Lamb is not an option. He had already given the man nuts and it would take a great man more than Lance could carry to fill him up. No men needed meat just as Lance did. Fish! He could not pass a day with eating at least a few and humans ate fish too of course, along with other things from the water like octopus. His minds unwilling wonders back to the memory of the swimmer from his i8sland, the one who had been killed by the great octopus. Florana soon to follow his death. He will not wrestle an octopus for this man but he does remember seeing the parade of lobsters the sea floor not long ago. Those he can hunt.  
He enters the water and swims low near the seafloor. Almost immediately he spots a large spiny male scuttling by himself. It pokes at an abandoned horseshoe crab shell. A renegade.  
Lance swims further out, deeper, where the kept forest growls wild. With a single slash of his long nails, he cuts through the tough fonds till he is rewarded with several long strands.  
Swimming back to the lobster who thankfully had not moved from his post, lance bunches up the kelp and drops it on him. Then he rolls the who mass into a ball and brings it back to the beach.  
Lance sets the lobster-kelp ball on the wet sand. Now that is a meal fit for his man… yes, his man. He likes the idea and can not bring himself to think of it otherwise.  
He dips a small trench until the sand grows moist below and rolls the kelp ball into it. for good measure, he trenches a gully to the shoreline. The waves wash up the trench and fill the hole to the brim. Lance Blocks the gully with sand   
He admires his work, content and happy with himself. This was almost fun.

A snapping noise comes from beyond the bushes and Lance jumps. Partly from fear, partly from the thrill.  
He clumsily hurries into the water, hopping like a seal until he can roll into the surf and swim off to hide behind the offshore rocks.

The man stumbles onto the beach. He is clutching his arm and his moves are pained and stilted. His shoulders sag. He wonders down onto the beach, close to the surface, his eyes land on the bowl and stops beside it. He stares at my tracks again and shakes his head.  
“what manner of beach you are, I can not tell.” He says loudly.  
“I fear you, but you feed me.”   
He leans his head back and caws to the  
“where are you!” he shakes his bow at the sky. Lance realizes he is no longer talking to him, but more than likely beseeching Alphor.   
“I shot a dove but I couldn’t find where it fell. My arrow went through its body and lay wet in the dirt!”  
He drops the bow in the sand and the way he moves Lance can tell the boy must be heavy especially shouldering it on his bad arm. He slips the quiver and sets it beside the bow  
“help me.”  
He stands, shoulder squared, waiting.  
Finally, when the sky did not thunder and the ground did not shake, he fell to his knees. He dipped his face in the bowl and drinks the water like a deer. He lifts his chin and puts an apricot whole into his mouth. The juices dribbled down his chin.  
Lance watches as he talks to himself but in normal tones now. He cannot catch the words. He wants to hear. Lance misses talk dearly: he and his sisters always talked a lot, but more than that, he wanted to know what the man says, what he thinks.   
Lance dived and swam underwater halfway to the shore. Sticking his head out of the water only enough so that his eyes and ears and nose are above the surface.  
If the man were to scan the water slowly and carefully, he might see him but lance was quick as silverfish, always faster than his sisters and he could swim away in an instant.

A movement catches Lance’s eye. A lobster claw emerges over the edge of the pool Lance had dug. Then the whole lobster climbs out. The man’s back is to the pool. The lobster is going to get away and he will not even see it. Lance did not create the man’s meal only for the main course to scuttle off unnoticed.  
Lance dives and grabs a nearby scallop and chucks it at the man hitting him squarely in the back of the head.  
“Ah!’ the man cries looking around for the source of his pain. He spots the lobster and scrambles across the sand to catch it, pain forgotten at the idea of meat. The lobster races across to the water. The man lunges and grabs it by the tail. The lobster turns and pinches him. The man yelps in pain and shakes his hand trying to dislodge it from his hand. The lobster went flying and lands a few feet away. It tossed sand in its agitated dismay and set out again for the water/  
The movement of his hand the tackling of the lobster must have jostled the man’s injured arm because he sits and rocks in pain, clutching at it. with a quick jaunt and a kick, he sends the angry lobster towards the pool. It pinches the strap of his sandal.  
The man hops backward with the lobster stuck to his shoe. He goes behind the nearby bushes and bends over, rummaging around the bush, his hands busy. Lance can not see what he is doing.. he lets out little cries of pain as he goes. Then he limps back onto the beach, still dragging the lobster on his shoe  
“and to think I've Always thought of persistence as a virtue,” the man says with a small laugh.  
Lance marvels that the man can laugh at this stubborn lobster when he is both hurt and hungry. Lance wants to laugh too: Man and Lobster are ridiculous.  
The man’s arms are full of sticks from his scrounging in the bush.  
He sets a longer stick aside and then arranges the other into a cone in the sand, with an open top. Almost like a barnacle shell.  
As he kneels, the lobster finally let loose of his shoe and hobbles towards the water.  
The man picks up the kelp ball from the pool and throws it at the lobster and smacks it with one of the sticks for good measure.  
“I’m sorry my valiant friend, but this may be life or death for us both.”  
He returns to his one of sticks. He breaks the twigs into a pile, then he pulled two rocks from the pouch he wore, where the little wooden lionfish rest. He strikes the two stones together. Lance’s eye go wide with awe as sparks fly from the two stones onto the cone, his breath catching. He strikes again, more sparks. The man puts his face low and blows softly on the pile of twigs. The sparks glow and then began to jump among the cone of sticks and set them aflame

Lance marvels at the glow and the sight of fire. He knows the story of the Titan Gyrgan who gave fire to humans and endured excruciating torture for his deed. Was that how the titan did. Did he gift them those special stones to create fire? Were they special rocks or would any rocks do? Lance had only been near open fire once in his entire life. Once lightning had struck a tree. The tree was at the water’s edge. He and his sister had listened to crackle and smelled the smoke and shrank away from the heat.  
The man’s fire flickered red and yellow. He pushed the sticks this way and that, blowing softly. He hummed and puffed, as though he had forgotten his pain but Lance was sure he had not.  
He picks up the stick he had been saving and got to his feet.  
With his foot he pushed aside the kelp, allowing the lobster to start to scuttle way.   
“Sorry, my friend but it is either you or me. You’ve earned an honorable death.”  
Lance loved the way he spoke to the lobster. He kicked the tiring thing over and then with a quick precise jab he speared the thing. The lobstered curled tightly around the stick.  
“it’ll be quick I swear,” the man said. He set down next to the now burning fire and stuck the lobster into the flames. The Lobster’s shell shrieked like a muted whistle.  
Suddenly the man spasmed, clutching his arm. He dropped the stick and collapsed.  
He was too close to flames  
Lance moved panic guiding his actions be for logic or fear of danger could intervene.  
He crawls and slithered across the sand to the man until he could roll him a body’s length away from the fire. He still hands on the man’s arm self-preservation finally sinking in. he was too close to this man. Too far out of the water. Florana’s death flashed through his mind and his heart began to pound. He must retreat.  
Then the man moaned, eyes still closed tight against the pain A pained sound wrenching sound that cut right through Lance’s panic  
Lance pulls himself around the man, careful to keep himself out of reach. The poison arm is worse than before. The swelling is greater and the odor turns his stomach. The Serpent’s bite will not heal.  
Lance remembers the show the creature put on for him only a few days ago. He is sure now, Hagar has warned him. He should not interfere.  
The man moans again. He wracked with pain and hunger. Lance is all this man has. He can not leave him to die. He thinks to the lionfish carved in his pouch. No, he can not leave this man to die, not when he has value for the sea. Not when he thinks it so beautiful that he would carve its creatures so expertly.

Lance pulls the lobster stick from the fire. The shell has turned a bright violent red. Skewering it with his long talon he places it in the sand. He thinks of the horseshoe crab shell he had seen the lobster fiddling with earlier. Quickly returning to the water he searched the bottom till he finds his prize and returns to the man.  
The man’s arm is hot to the touch. The skin just below the shoulder is tight and glistening in bruised purples and blacks.  
Lance breaks off the tail of the horseshoe crab’s shell and holds it over the fire until the tip screams and turns black. It's sharp as urchin's spines  
He holds down the man’s arm with one hand in a vice grip then jabbed the tip of the tail into the center of the wound.  
The man screams as the pus spurts. His eyes open, his hands clutch at the air. Lance moves back a fraction, wincing. He never wanted to bring the man any pain but it needed to be done.  
Pus pours from the wound, staining the white sand.  
He fills the crab shell with sea water and dumps it over the wound and hurries back and forth. He refills, returns, and presses the wound over and over until crimson blood runs freely and stench ceases.  
The whole time the man hunts and rocks his head and shoulders. He crosses the free arm over his chest, to clutch at himself. His eyes stare into the eyes. Into nothing but blue but they are dry. He has not once turned to look at Lance and for that he is grateful.  
Lances own eyes almost prickled with tears of his own at the man’s pain. The man is brave.  
His rocking subsides  
His arm slackens and his hand no longer clutches into the sand.  
Lance quickly moves a safe distance away but the man does not move to sand or chase him.  
Lance torn between fear and desire stills. He is close enough to the water that it would be nothing or him to make it into the sure before the man could even will his muscles to fallow his thoughts but the man is exhausted. Lance can sense it on him.  
With a sigh and a set jaw he cautiously pulls the bowl of water closer to the man takes out some of the apricots. He deftly slices them with into halves with his nails and places them in the horseshoe crab’s shell. The lobster is warm tot eh touch now, so he cracks it open and pulled the juicy white meat form the red shell and sets that atop the fruit.  
The man breath easily and his eyes are still open but he does not look in Lance’s direction. Only up at the endly sky. His eyes do not wonder to lance, though he is sure the man knows exactly where he sits.  
Lance watches the embers of the flames for a moment, the man stares heavenwards. Lance reaches out a hand and pushes the food-laden shell closer to him.   
Suddenly his hands dart out and touch lance’s light.  
He pulls it back instantly and then rolls into the sea and swims away in terror.  
When Lance chances a look back, the man is laying in the sand still unmoved save for his head which has turned towards the lapping waves. He is staring at Lance with an open mouth and look of wonder on his pale face


End file.
